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Future Alert: Sickels Releases Cubs Top 20

One of the best things about the offseason is the releases of annual prospect rankings, and today comes another one as John Sickels of Minor League Ball released his Cubs Top 20 (21) rankings, complete with prospect grades and a look at a few outsiders looking in.

Dabynsky previously took a look at Sickels grading scale and predicted where prospects would fall over at our Chicago Now blog after Sickels released a preliminary report of how many players in the system would fall into which grade.

A: It wasn’t the most difficult to guess, as Javier Baez and Kris Bryant were the two prospects given A’s as the #1 and #2 prospects on the farm.

A-: Still technically an A of sorts, as Albert Almora checks in at #3 with an A-. Note that the team’s first round (non-supplemental) draft picks from 2011, 2012 and 2013 all earned at least an A-.

B+: Dabynsky’s perfect streak stayed alive, assigning both C.J. Edwards and Jorge Soler B+’s. Soler was ranked #4 and Edwards came up at #5. What’s better than having a B+ pitching prospect (besides having four position prospects with at least that rank)? Maybe having that B+ position prospect and two other Top 20 prospects acquired in a single trade? Ya, that sounds good.

B-: Not part of the Garza trade, but rather the Dempster trade, Christian Villanueva is another solid prospect acquired from Texas. Like Edwards, Villanueva was not the only player acquired in the same trade that made this list.

About Jackson Scofield

I cover the minor leagues for World Series Dreaming. You probably don't read my articles. Also have been doing Chicago Fire coverage, press pass and all, for ChiCitySports. Studying Journalism with a focus in sports at Columbia College Chicago. Go Hawks (The hockey team, but go Boise too)!

One thought on “Future Alert: Sickels Releases Cubs Top 20”

Interesting to see what the system looks like even without the drafts. Hoyer has extracted serious value from the tradeable assets (and this list doesn’t include the people in the majors, like Grimm/Arrieta/Strop/Rizzo).